Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Hey Arnold: Sequelitis

"I won't be doing sequels to Total Recall, Commando, Predator or Twins. I was contacted about doing a sequel to Commando, but I had no interest; it was the same with Predator. A Twins sequel was never a thought in anybody's mind, and neither was a sequel to Red Heat...it was been the same routine with just about every movie I've ever done...there's so little time to do all the things I want to do that I can't see any reason to get bogged down in sequels."

- Arnold Schwarzenegger, 1991

23 years later and Arnold has kept his word although a sequel to Twins is in the works that would add Eddie Murphy to the long lost, genetically altered siblings hilarity for the proposed Triplets. While Arnie might not have been hot to revisit the roles of Hauser, John Matrix, Dutch Schaeffer or Ivan Danko, he doesn't have any current problems revisiting certain iconic and lucrative franchises. Terminator 5 is currently in production, a sequel to Conan is in the works and he's about to pop up for his 3rd mission with The Expendables. Once upon a time, a sequel to 1994's "boring husband who's actually a spy" thriller True Lies was in the works but at a certain point, middle eastern terrorists were no longer funny and the project was abandoned. But try telling that to co-star Tom Arnold who is still holding out hope. In the mid 90's, young Robert Rodriguez wrote a Predator sequel that would have followed Arnold on the alien hunters' home planet while recruiting fellow cinematic tough guy Jean-Claude Van Damme but the expensive script languished. Years later, the concept was dusted off and rewritten to make Predators and included a cameo for The Oak which didn't happen. Fox and WWE Studios have teamed up for an Arnold-less sequel to 1996's "dads fighting crowds, each other, racism and capitalism at Christmas" comedy Jingle All the Way which is due out in 2015.